[joefromchicago]

Originally Posted by Art Deco

I've noticed that runners don't advance on third strikes which get away from the catcher, via passed ball or wild pitch, even (and especially) when the batter reaches.

I can see the runner from 3rd not wanting to risk at play at home, but the other runners are even further away and should advance.

This question has me baffled. First of all, on a purely definitional level, if runners don't advance on a wild pitch or passed ball, then it wasn't a wild pitch or passed ball. A wild pitch or passed ball is when the pitch eludes the catcher and runners advance as a result. Ergo and ipso facto, no advance = no wild pitch/passed ball.

But I suppose the question really is "why don't runners advance on a dropped third strike?" There are only eight different ways that bases can be occupied:

• no runners on base
• runner on first*
• runner on second
• runner on third
• runners on first and second*
• runners on first and third*
• runners on second and third
• bases loaded*

In the situations marked with an asterisk, the batter is out on a dropped third strike with less than two outs. In those situations, therefore, we wouldn't expect the runners to advance unless the pitch was so wild or the ball so passed that they'd advance even if it weren't a third strike. In other words, they'd advance just the same as they would in any other situation where a pitch eludes the catcher. In the other situations, there's no force play for the runners so they don't have to advance on the errant pitch, although they probably should if there's a good chance they will be safe..

When there are two outs, a runner should be advancing every time there's a dropped third strike and there's a potential force play on him. If you're not seeing that in OOTP, then that's a problem. So, for instance, if there's a runner on first with two outs and the catcher drops the third strike on the batter, that runner on first better be running.

For runners who aren't faced with a potential force play (i.e. runners on second or third or runners on both second and third), again they should advance if they can do so safely. But just because a catcher drops a third strike doesn't mean it's the equivalent of a wild pitch or passed ball. As long as the catcher doesn't catch the third strike cleanly and it ends up on the ground, the batter should try to run to first base - after all, it's a no-lose play. The worst that can happen to him is that he's called out at first, and since he already struck out that's not much of a penalty. For him, then, running to first on a dropped third strike is 100% upside.

For the runners on second and third, however, it's a different story. They won't try to advance unless there's a good chance of doing so safely, and not every dropped third strike ends up at the backstop. So if the ball is at the catcher's feet, the batter is going to run to first but the runner on third would be crazy to try and score.

Does OOTP recreate that situation accurately? I have no clue. But I'll bet that someone somewhere (probably a fat guy in his parents' basement sitting at a computer with a half-eaten bucket of KFC Original Recipe in his lap) has crunched the numbers and determined how often an un-forced runner advances on a dropped third strike. And if I had to guess, I'd guess that it's probably not as often as you think it is.